A {{w|trebuchet}} is a large catapult, invented in medieval times to attack castles, that works by dropping a raised counter weight to rotate the throwing arm. Hence the 'drop thirty pounds fast' doesn't refer to losing body weight, but rather to dropping the counter weight to launch the projectile. In a similar manner, "We'll help you hit your target" at first glance would seem to be referring to hitting your new years resolution target (goal) of losing weight, but in the context of a trebuchet club it literally means to hit a physical target (i.e. a {{w|Bullseye_(target)|bullseye}} or a {{w|City_wall|wall}}, etc.) with the trebuchet's payload.

A {{w|trebuchet}} is a large catapult, invented in medieval times to attack castles, that works by dropping a raised counter weight to rotate the throwing arm. Hence the 'drop thirty pounds fast' doesn't refer to losing body weight, but rather to dropping the counter weight to launch the projectile. In a similar manner, "We'll help you hit your target" at first glance would seem to be referring to hitting your new years resolution target (goal) of losing weight, but in the context of a trebuchet club it literally means to hit a physical target (i.e. a {{w|Bullseye_(target)|bullseye}} or a {{w|City_wall|wall}}, etc.) with the trebuchet's payload.

−

The only hint that the flyer advertises a trebuchet club is in the drawing at the bottom of the flyer. The subtitle indicates that this hint "may have been too subtle". The title text suggest they will announce the existence of the trebuchet club by the least subtle way: presumably by attacking the city with a trebuchet.

+

The only hint that the flyer advertises a trebuchet club is in the drawing at the bottom of the flyer. The subtitle indicates that this hint "may have been too subtle". The title text suggest they will announce the existence of the trebuchet club by the least subtle way: presumably by attacking the town with a trebuchet.

Revision as of 01:07, 15 January 2013

Title text: If the flyers don't work, we'll switch to the LEAST subtle method of informing a town of the existence of a trebuchet club.

Explanation

The comic presents a flyer with a text typically found in an advertisement for a "Weight Loss Program", but instead it announces a trebuchet club in a subtle way.
A trebuchet is a large catapult, invented in medieval times to attack castles, that works by dropping a raised counter weight to rotate the throwing arm. Hence the 'drop thirty pounds fast' doesn't refer to losing body weight, but rather to dropping the counter weight to launch the projectile. In a similar manner, "We'll help you hit your target" at first glance would seem to be referring to hitting your new years resolution target (goal) of losing weight, but in the context of a trebuchet club it literally means to hit a physical target (i.e. a bullseye or a wall, etc.) with the trebuchet's payload.

The only hint that the flyer advertises a trebuchet club is in the drawing at the bottom of the flyer. The subtitle indicates that this hint "may have been too subtle". The title text suggest they will announce the existence of the trebuchet club by the least subtle way: presumably by attacking the town with a trebuchet.

Transcript

[Poster with drawing of Megan and Cueball in bottom left corner, castle in bottom right corner and a curved line between them. On the poster is some large text.]

Discussion

"Dropping Thirty Pounds Fast"? Is that a reference to the projectile weight being approx 30lb and "dropping" it on someone's walls? DD (talk) 10:03, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

I was thinking more along the lines of thirty pounds of blood and dismembered flesh. Davidy22[talk] 10:46, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

A trebuchet works by dropping a large weight connected to the swing arm, thereby propelling the projectile in a parabola (hopefully) towards the target. Thus, by dropping 30 lbs fast, you may literally hit your target. -- ‎62.109.36.140 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Anyhow the explanation is a little off. The "subtlety" referred to is not that people tend to ignore weight loss flyers. It is that the flyer looks like a flyer for a weight loss programme, while it is actually trying to recruit people for something entirely different. Most people would not get this and sign up thinking that they would lose body weight, while they would be signing up for the trebuchet club. The only hint is the drawing, really. I agree with the above comment that the "dropping 30lbs" probably refers to the projectile. 62.25.36.19 10:52, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

Actually - I didn't mean that the 30lbs was the projectile but rather the counterweight propelling the projectile. 62.109.36.140 12:53, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

My vote is that 30lbs stands for the projectile. 70.31.159.230 15:55, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

30lbs for the projectile is most consistent with the alt-text, which implies that they will be hurling projectiles at the town. A 30lbs counterweight would only be able to fling a projectile an order of magnitude smaller. Also, for medieval trebuchets the "average mass of the projectiles was probably around 50–100 kg" (Wikipedia article) --Forlackofabettername (talk) 16:23, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

A trebuchet club would likely be building smaller models than the original medieval ones, so my vote is the 30lbs is referring to the counterweight, not the projectile. In a trebuchet, the counterweight drops fast, whereas the projectile doesn't initially drop at all, but it rather launches upwards and sideways; it'll be some time before it starts dropping, and even then not very quickly as the vertical speed takes some time to switch from up to zero, and then finally down, eventually building up speed to something that might be considered "FAST". But the "FAST" is mostly in the horizontal direction rather than seen as a "drop". In the meantime, that counterweight had already dropped more directly a long time ago. --boB

Even the projectiles will take more to drop, it still quite "FAST" compare any weight loss program, so I think it can still refer to the projectile. Arifsaha (talk) 18:17, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

I can just imagine someone from the club saying "Let's drop 30 lbs on the target". Besides, I'd consider the usage of the word "drop" to be more metaphorical because in the operation of a trebuchet, no individual actually drops a counterweight; they simply pull a pin or cut a rope. 70.31.159.230 20:54, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

Image could also be mistaken for two people taking a walk by a hill to a castle; which would be consistent with mistaking the add for one for weight-loss; The absence of any trebuchet in the picture suggests this is deliberate. 144.124.1.121 10:04, 16 January 2013 (UTC)

Although there is ambiguity here, I would think that the 30 pounds is referring to the counterweight. This is due to the fact that any device can hurl a projectile (spring catapult, torsion device, and of course trebuchet) but what sets the trebuchet apart from the rest is that it is powered by falling mass. Also, any trebuchet club that is just starting will likely be building small golfball trebuchets which would likely use counterweights on the scale of 30 pounds. I agree the alt-text makes more sense if they are actually hurling 30 pounds, but I think the main joke here is the comic that makes use of the fact that a trebuchet is literally a dropping weight. Lastly, you aren't "dropping" the projectile, you are hurling it. -- 72.71.205.240 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Of course it's truly pedantic, but has anybody considered that dropping a 30-pound counterweight to fling a projectile imparts the same amount of energy1 to the target as dropping a 30-pound "projectile" (which would be more like a bomb in this case) on the target from roughly the same height the counterweight drops? So dropping a 30-pound counterweight on a trebuchet is very much indeed like dropping a 30-pound payload directly on your target, albeit at an angle that's more likely to be disadvantageous to the target, and from a location that's generally easier to occupy.

1This is disregarding the additional friction losses, of course, which would be higher in the case of flinging a projectile with a trebuchet than in the case of dropping a bomb, due to friction in the trebuchet's axle or other mechanisms, the greater distance the projectile most likely travels as well as the higher speed with which it does so, and the projectile's lower mass and thus lower inertia.Daddy (talk) 14:01, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

But what IS the LEAST subtle method???204.138.232.251 20:40, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I'm surprised that nobody else has mentioned (or that I have somehow managed to skim over) the reference to the usual over-figerative depiction of "hitting a target" in such aspirationally motivating advertising, i.e. an archery target with an arrow in the bullseye. Or unpierced, but pensively awaiting the projectile, depicted in flight (in extreme perspective, heading intothe page that the target often faces straight out from) or otherwise. (I suspect that the phenomena extends to firearms targets as well, especially in communities with a relatively high amount of target-shooting involvement. I'm sure I've seen the old "german soldier silhouette" image used, albeit very rarely.) But, anyway, I can imagine that Randall is additionally riffing off the number of "Hit your target!" flyers with a bullseye motif... but skewing that to the fictional target reader's expectation that a motif or depiction of a parabolic trajectory might be supposed to convey exactly the same thing, rather than its actual literalist meaning. 178.99.226.118 00:44, 29 March 2013 (UTC)

I'm impressed that nobody added to the explanation how much is 30 pounds in kilograms. I did that now. 108.162.212.18 00:18, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

It is a FLYER from a trebuchet club geddit? 141.101.104.169 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Tools

It seems you are using noscript, which is stopping our project wonderful ads from working. Explain xkcd uses ads to pay for bandwidth, and we manually approve all our advertisers, and our ads are restricted to unobtrusive images and slow animated GIFs. If you found this site helpful, please consider whitelisting us.